MA in Theology

This taught Masters allows students to gain advanced theological knowledge of central Christian doctrines. The Diploma is available for those who complete the teaching modules without the dissertation.

This programme aims to:

enable students to focus on appropriate depth on a variety of different topics within the subdisciplines of Christian Theology and ethics;

provide opportunities for students to reflect upon and integrate prior study and other relevant experience with a wide range of new learning which is informed by research-led scholarship;

provide a digital space in which students may engage in informed and respectful dialogue, recognising the strengths and weaknesses of other points of view;

provide the knowledge and skills necessary to produce a research dissertation through sustained reflection on and engagement with a theological or ethical topic; and

develop an appreciation of the value of Christian doctrine for the life of the Church.

Union Theological College, originally known as the Assembly’s College, dates back to 1853. In the early nineteenth century, those who hoped to serve as Presbyterian ministers were educated either in Scotland or at the Belfast Academical Institute, opened in 1814 as both a secondary school and a college. Irish Presbyterianism underwent a significant change in 1840 when the General Synod of Ulster and the Secession Synod were united to establish the Presbyterian Church in Ireland (PCI). The new denomination’s first General Assembly was held on 10 July 1840.